Chemical weapons experts are reportedly in Turkey to investigate the alleged sarin attack in Syria

Youth
inspect rubble of a damaged house after an airstrike yesterday on
rebel-held Daraa Al-Balad, Syria April 7,
2017.REUTERS/Alaa
Al-Faqir

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A team of experts from the global chemical
weapons watchdog has been sent to Turkey to collect samples as
part of an investigation into an alleged chemical weapons attack
in Syria last week that killed 87 people.

The fact finding mission was sent from the Organisation for the
Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague to gather
bio-metric samples and interview survivors, sources told Reuters
on Thursday.

The toxic gas attack on April 4, which killed scores of children,
prompted the United States to launch missile strikes on a Syrian
air base and widened a rift between the United States and Russia,
a close Syrian ally.

The OPCW mission will determine whether chemical weapons were
used, but is not mandated to assign blame. Its findings, expected
in 3-4 weeks, will be passed to a joint United Nations-OPCW
investigation tasked with identifying individuals or institutions
responsible for using chemical weapons.

Investigators have concluded that sarin, chlorine and sulfur
mustard gas have been used in Syria's civil war. Government
forces used chlorine, while Islamic State militants used sulfur
mustard.

Last week's bombing in the town of Khan Sheikhoun in the
rebel-held province of Idlib near the Turkish border was the most
lethal since a sarin attack on Aug. 21, 2013 killed hundreds in a
suburb of the capital, Damascus.